章 20: Now It Begins

"Ahhh…I'm so tired," Poul yawned and stretched his arms up.

The interview took longer than he expected. Asking the same questions to a different applicant was a pain in the ass for Poul.

But, on the good side of it, he finally met prominent engineers who will be working on their company starting Friday. He found nothing in their behavior or attitude that could affect the productivity of the company, and so in the end, he hired them all.

Staring up at the ceiling, Poul noticed that his company is getting lucky and lucky at every moment. Bumping into the largest financier in the United States of Avalonia, met the railroad magnates in the country that ordered hundreds of their products, and lastly, talented engineers applying for a job in his company.

Though seventy-five percent of the applicants failed the initial screening process, which is the exam, they can still apply for available positions in the factory that are more on hand such as repairman, machinist, quality control inspector, assembler, manager, and so on and so forth. The company is offering the highest salary on the market so he's sure that they'll be tempted to apply even though they failed at the position they were after.

Poul exhaled deeply before returning back to his work. He sorted the documents the applicants passed that contained their resumes and other important documents.

Seconds later, there was a knock on the door.

Poul looked up to see who it was and there he saw Jonathan, lifting a tray of coffee

"It seems that you are done with the interview," Jonathan said, looking around the office. "Want some coffee? I brewed you one."

"That would be lovely," Poul accepted his generous offer and Jonathan placed a coffee cup on a saucer on his table carefully.

The plume of steam above the cup filled the air with its aroma. Tempted at the smell, Poul reached for the coffee and sipped on it gently. A bitter taste lingered on his tongue as he savored the first sip of the warm liquid.

Poul sighed in satisfaction, contentment settling over him. If it wasn't for the time constraints, he could stay here forever. But he has deadlines to meet.

"This menial job is killing me, you know? All this clerical work like managing the worker's salary, tabulating data, receiving orders, and more…all of this is stealing me of valuable time which I could use to work on designing our next project."

"Then why don't we hire a secretary? A secretary that is good on the job?" Jonathan suggested.

Poul hummed as he thought. Now that Jonathan brought that up, he realized that the company is lacking clerical workers. A person whose job is this easy yet time-consuming job. They definitely need to hire a secretary, and not just any secretary, the best one in the industry.

"Where are we going to find one?" Poul returned a question.

"Well, we can ask Mister Morgan about that," Jonathan sat across from him. "Oh, speaking of Mister Morgan. Do you remember when I said I'll call Mister Morgan and ask if we can have a direct current dynamo from parallel Thomas Edison? Assuming that he exists in this world."

"Yes, I do remember you saying that," Poul said, looking at the papers and stamping them.

"It turns out, the parallel Thomas Edison exists in this world as well. But his name is different. He goes by the name of James Russell. Inventor of the phonograph, mimeograph, gramophone, and get this, a carbon filament the light bulb that can last up to fourteen and a half hours," Jonathan exclaimed as he explained.

"Hmm…so he does exist? How did you know all about this? Don't tell me, you asked Mister Morgan?"

"How else can I know?" Jonathan spread his arms wide and shrugged. "According to Mister Morgan, Edi—I mean Russell is planning on opening a power utility station in New York, lighting one square mile with his light bulbs and electric pole light using a direct current system."

"Hoh?" Poul mused.

"But don't worry about it. We should focus on our venture first before jumping into the electric industry. James Russell is a celebrity, a wizard of Menlo Park, let him have his moment. Advertise the advantages of using electric light over gas lamps, and its uses in the factories."

"I know where you are heading Jonathan. You are saying Russell is a free advertisement for our alternating current distribution system, right?"

"One thing I learned by working in this company is that we provide better and cheap solutions to the customers," Jonathan said.

"So what about the dynamos? Did you happen to get one of them?"

"Mister Morgan said he'll ask Russell if he can sell us the dynamo, along with the bulbs and the motors," Jonathan said.

"Good," Poul stamped another piece of paper and set it aside.

Jonathan came to the office to ask Poul something but he forgot it. But looking at what he is doing helped him remember it.

"How many engineers passed the selections?"

"Ten," Poul answered.

"Ten?" Jonathan repeated. "Poul we need as many engineers as we can get."

"No, we don't really need a lot of them, yet. Ten would be enough. And those ten that I hired, are the best of the best. Their job is to help us design and materialize our future inventions. Basically, they are the research and development guys. The thirty men that I rejected can still apply for a job in the factory," Poul explained.

"And among those ten, is there someone who has your attention?"

"Yeah, two of them. Timothy and Walter. Timothy graduated from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and Walter is an immigrant from the German Empire, graduating from the Technical University of Munich. Though Timothy has this prideful and cocky attitude, he has the brains to back it up."

"Well, as long as he's doing something meaningful, I'd say we keep him," Jonathan said.

"Friday it is," Poul said.

***

The day of Friday arrived. The venue of the seminar was the makeshift classroom where the applicants took their tests.

There are twenty-five people inside the classroom, excluding Poul and Jonathan. Fifteen of them were the ones who failed the test but applied for another position, while the rest are the new engineers of the Axelsen & Nielsen Air Brake Company.

Poul and Jonathan stood in the front and introduced themselves.

"I'm Poul Nielsen, founder of the Axelsen and Nielsen Air Brake Company. My specialty is mechanical and electrical engineering, though electrical engineering is in its infancy, soon it will take over the world."

"I'm Jonathan Axelsen, and my specialty is civil and structural engineering. Every building you see here, the foundry, the factory, the apartment, the cafeteria, even this one, is my design and creation."

"The Axelsen and Nielsen Air Brake Company was founded out of tragedy. Hundreds of train accidents are caused by brake malfunctions. The brake system was inefficient before our invention came out," Poul said and prompted Jonathan to continue.

"Imagine our country as a human body. The manufacturing companies are the heart, the trains are the red blood cells, the railway networks as blood vessels, and the states or cities are organs. Manufacturing companies pump out products to the whole nation. How is it delivered? Through blood cells, how do we make sure it goes to where it was intended? The railway network. Now imagine, if the blood cell breaks down in the middle of the journey, what do you think will happen?" Jonathan ended and Poul continued.

"Well, the obvious reason is that the goods aren't not going to arrive anymore, pissing off a lot of people."

The room chuckled at Poul's humor. Once it gradually settled, Poul resumed.

"Not only are the goods destroyed, the lives of the people too. Not only that, but the train also damaged the blood vessel, which is the network of rails. So the goods were not delivered to the organ, and what do you think will happen when blood fails to deliver oxygen to the organ?"

"The tissues and the muscles of the organ will die because it can't function without oxygen," Timothy answered simply.

"That's correct. Organ failure represents a state suffering in an economic decline. Economic decline is bad for our country. Without trains to deliver goods around the country, the economy will halt, and worse plummet. So, the Axelsen & Nielsen Company invented a product that will stop that from happening. Air brakes, a simple device that can save goods, people, and the economy."

"The railroad industry has been growing at an unprecedented rate," Jonathan chimed in. "The increase of steam locomotives is an increase to our market size. The bigger the market size, the bigger the profit the company will yield."

"Remember, our company was not only founded to prevent a tragedy. We also sell comfort. In comfort, we already invented the draft, and for safety. But the biggest of them all is safety. And there is a bigger enemy out there that an air brake can't beat," Poul said.

"There are hundreds of railroad companies in the United States of Avalonia. But their networks get interconnected and jumbled up, leading to trains colliding at the same track. But that'll be announced in the future," Jonathan said.

"Remember again, our company's goal is to make the train the most efficient, reliable, safe, and cost-effective means of transportation. After all, the company's existence depends on the trains. Without it, we are nothing," Poul clapped his hand as he ended the introduction. "Now, as for what you are going to do, the engineers will be focused on the research and development, helping us. The rest maintain the quality of our product going out of the factory."

"If you have questions, raise your hand."

Timothy raised his hand. "Are we going to start working today?"

"Yes," Jonathan answered. "Okay, let's move!"

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